Through the Looking Glass
by Starsinger
Summary: Carol watches Kirk's STID issues from the perspective of an outsider.


**Through the Looking Glass**

by Starsinger

**The end of STID through Carol Marcus' eyes, yeah, that scene in the sickbay. Don't own them.**

Carol was helping out the medical staff as much as her knee would allow, hobbling around on a cane, when the call came through from Engineering. Scotty was asking for a team with another body bag. McCoy looked around, body bags were becoming short in supply. After much rustling through the morgue, Carol finally located one and handed it to the team. "I wonder who it is this time?" McCoy asked. He looked exhausted. The fight had left him with over two hundred bags with bodies in them and another thirty plus injured. Minutes later the team reentered Sickbay with the bag in tow. Scotty was with them, his face white and pinched. He appeared to be grinding his lips together trying to hold in his emotions. Carol wondered briefly who was in the bag to cause such grief and devotion.

They placed the bag on the gurney before the lead took a deep breath and looked at McCoy, Carol could almost see the pity in the young man's eyes as he opened the bag. She gasped as Kirk's lifeless face, eyes closed, lay there. She was stunned, this man had faced down her father and a raving lunatic, only to fall victim to. She suddenly remembered hearing the whispers of someone going into the radioactive warp core chamber to restart the engines. The pain etched into Kirk's face told her that it was him, he'd done this to save his family, his ship.

Her father, the late Admiral Marcus, would never have done this. He would have abandoned the ship and her crew and proclaimed, "Look what those damn fool Klingons are capable of!" Whenever she had accompanied him on ships she'd seen looks of respect, even fear and the occasional fanaticism, but no devotion and love, yes, love. This crew loved their captain, and now that he lay dead in their Sickbay, they gathered around, tears and grief apparent on every face except one. McCoy, his face wasn't that of grief, it was of complete and utter devastation. Even she couldn't help but feel that something was desperately wrong here. He was supposed to be something more, more to her.

Carol remembered walking through the ship in his wake, the Captain's. Unlike her father who just nodded at various crewmembers, Jim smiled and called them by name. He had to have perfect recall to know every one of the four hundred plus crew members by name. It didn't matter if it was a raw recruit, green ensign, or his crusty CMO, they all adored their captain. McCoy had his equipment near at hand, ready for the autopsy, but the look said simply that he couldn't bring himself to do it, not now. He turned and headed for a chair near that Tribble. Cute creature, she thought absently, it made an appealing noise, like a cat. Soon, McCoy heard the noise too and stared at the creature, then commanded everyone in the room, "Get me a cryotube now!"

Carol watched as his crew galvanized into action as she headed over to find out what was going on, "That Tribble was dead. Now, after I injected it with Khan's blood, it's alive. If his blood can do that to a tribble…" his words trailed off as desperate hope flared in his eyes. The nurses pulled the cryotube in as she hit the side of Jim's neck with a hypo to prepare his body for cryogenic freezing. "Get him out of the cryotube and keep him in a coma. This is the only way to preserve his brain function," McCoy muttered.

"How much of Khan's blood is left?" Carol asked quietly.

"None," McCoy nodded as he went over and hit the com, "Sickbay to Spock! Spock! Dammit, I need Khan alive." He muttered as Carol and the medics stripped Kirk out of his clothing. She gasped at the scars on his back. They looked like whip marks. McCoy was grim, "Don't worry about those, they're old." Stripped down just before being inserted into the tube, Carol had to admit Jim was a very fine specimen of a male half of the human species. She shook her head to clear it as McCoy told her to activate the cryogenic sequence. Her fingers flew over the panel as it slid shut and frost hid the captain's face mercifully from her view.

McCoy resorted to calling the bridge to tell them what he needed. Then, they sat back and waited. It was the hardest thing possible, but all they could do. Eventually, Spock dragged Khan in, literally. The man's arm was clearly broken and he was unconscious, but no one really cared. M'benga sat Spock down in a biobed while he checked the Vulcan out. A tiny fracture of the skull, some bruises and lacerations, but he would be fine. He injected Spock with something to repair the damage, and Spock was suddenly grateful for a Vulcan specialist on board. McCoy disappeared with Khan's blood and returned soon as Sickbay was overwhelmed by Starfleet personnel wanting nothing more than to help. Carol lost track of McCoy and Jim, and by the time she and the rest of the crew were shuttled down to various points on the North American continent for treatment, she learned that he was in critical condition, very much alive, in Zurich.

McCoy entered Jim's hospital room where Carol stood, watching Jim breathe. The coma kept him under, so he wasn't much of a conversationalist at the moment. Without looking up, Carol commented, "This is what a Starship Captain should be. I spent my life watching my father be feared and hated, and occasionally respected, but never loved. No one would ever have gone as far as you did to save my Father's life." McCoy didn't know what to say to that, "It's alright, McCoy, I never knew what being a captain should be before now, and it was a good lesson to learn." McCoy watched as she leaned over and kissed Jim on the lips before departing.

"Out cold for three days and he's still attracting women, unbelievable!" McCoy muttered.


End file.
